


At the Ministry

by KateKintail



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Daisy Chain of Awesome, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-16
Updated: 2014-01-16
Packaged: 2018-01-08 21:43:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1137722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KateKintail/pseuds/KateKintail
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cedric is uncertain about his future</p>
            </blockquote>





	At the Ministry

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: JKR’s characters. I play for free and for fun.
> 
> Notes: Written for the Harry Potter Daisy Chain of Awesome

Cedric always figured he would end up somewhere at the Ministry of Magic. That’s where his father worked and where his aunt and uncle worked. Even three of his four grandparents had worked there. He would have liked to have been good enough to play professional Quidditch, and he was Hufflepuff team captain. But he just didn’t think he was good enough for that. And he certainly didn’t have any burning desire to work at a store or even own his own store. The fact of the matter was, he didn’t have any particular idea of what he wanted to do.

So when his father asked where he was thinking of working after Hogwarts, Cedric told him “probably the Ministry.” Cedric’s father had been so overjoyed that he invited Cedric him to come to work one day. Amos Diggory worked for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures at the Ministry, which sounded interesting—not thrilling by any stretch of the imagination, but interesting enough for Cedric to agree to go along to humor him. 

Cedric had memories of tagging along with his father when he was young and his mother was busy running errands or going to knitting club. He remembered sitting under his father’s desk playing with action figures that dueled with each other. He remembered sitting in a booster seat in the Ministry cafeteria while his father cut up a chicken breast for him during lunch with all of his father’s coworkers. And he remembered catching the paper airplane memos that came to his father’s desk and working hard to sound out the words. 

He wasn’t exactly sure how much he was allowed to know about what his father worked on, now that he understood more than the fact that his father worked in a big, magical building. There were bound to be some regulations about how much information non-employees were allowed to view. 

Soon, Cedric not only knew that there were regulations, but he was also bored out of his mind. Sitting and watching his father work on something he wasn’t able to look at was pointless. He would have given just about anything for some dueling action figures to play with now. “Dad, when are we going to get lunch?” Cedric asked a few hours into the morning, after counting every ceiling tile… twice. 

His father replied without looking up. “At lunchtime. If you’re hungry, go get a snack from the kiosk at the end of the hall.” 

Cedric wasn’t the least bit hungry, but at least it gave him something to do. He made a point of walking there as slowly as possible. And then he stood in front of the kiosk for a long while, debating inwardly the pros and cons involved in crisps versus crackers. 

And then a marvelous thing happened: someone knocked over the potted plant by the lifts. The pot broke into pieces, dirt spilled everywhere, and the pods on the plant began exploding, releasing some sort of powder into the air. Relieved to have something useful to do, Cedric abandoned the food he wasn’t interested in eating and immediately went to help. He coughed as he got close. Several Ministry officials were hurrying over to help clean up the mess, but Cedric offered to take over so they could get back to work. 

The air was thick with the powder, and Cedric couldn’t stop coughing, even though he buried his face in the crook of his arm. So the first thing he did was to pull out his wand and utter a spell to clear the air. The powder slowly dispersed to reveal a gorgeous young woman with short purple hair. Despite his promise to help with the mess, he paused, unable to keep from staring at her. 

“I’m such a klutz sometimes,” she said, trying to round up all the pieces of the pot so she could put it back together with a spell. “My mind was elsewhere. No permanent damage done, though.” Cedric handed her the piece closest to him, and she smiled at him. That smile made him go all warm and tingly. “Ta,” she said. 

If he had been a Gryffindor, Cedric might have been brave enough to ask her for her name or to inquire as to why she was there. Instead, he just stared and looked away shyly as soon as he realized his gaze had been fixed upon her. 

She was the one to take the initiative and speak. “If you don’t mind my asking, you look a little young to be working for the Ministry.”

“I’m just visiting my father who works here,” Cedric said, gesturing down the hall towards the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. “Um, and you?”

“I’m in training to be an Auror. They needed a little extra paperwork from me.”

Cedric’s eyes grew wide. Not only was she a beautiful woman but also working to be an Auror? His heartbeat raced. “Really?”

“Yeah, the training’s hard enough but the paperwork is a killer,” she laughed. “Keep that in mind when you figure out what you want to do after Hogwarts.”

Cedric shook his head. “I don’t think I could be an Auror. I’m not brave or smart enough. I’m just a Hufflepuff—”

“So am I,” she said, smiling. “And I was still accepted into the program. So you can never really tell, can you? You might make a great Auror. You won’t know unless you try.” 

Confidence bubbling up inside him, he grinned.

“I hope to see you around.” She leaned forward and kissed his cheek.


End file.
